


Merry and Bright

by NorthernLights37



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Jonerys Advent 2020, Jonerys Advent Day 25, Look it's me you know what I do by now, Romance, Some angst, Unless you are new and then, Welcome to the Jungle, fluff as well, friends to lovers?, idk - Freeform, maybe? - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:27:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28330866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NorthernLights37/pseuds/NorthernLights37
Summary: Arya Stark finds a way to bring her favorite cousin and her roommate together for the holiday season, without lifting a finger.
Relationships: Jon Snow/Daenerys Targaryen
Comments: 24
Kudos: 297





	Merry and Bright

**Author's Note:**

> MERRY CHRISTMAS SLUTS!
> 
> Sorry for two things - Number 1, posting this so late in the day, but I mean, I have a family and apparently you definitely hang out with them Christmas Day. Number 2, yes it's a two parter, sorry, I know, I know, but this isnt a long fic, part 2 will be up in about two days.
> 
> Then we get back to our final installment of FIXER UPPER YES SLUTS JOE SNOW
> 
> This fic is DEFINITELY for my baby boo, my amazon Queen, Magali Dragon for being my ride or die homie, even when the night is dark and full of terrors.

* * *

It’s disgusting, the way Christmas decorations go up the moment Halloween is over.

Dany is still sorting through the piles of miniature candy bars leftover from the handful of kids who made the rounds at her complex by the next morning. The first day of November is cold and clear in White Harbor, a few inches of snow already on the ground, no surprise for the North.

It’s her third year in this icy, wretched wasteland, and she thinks she might just pull off her graduate degree before her fingers suffer permanent damage from persistent, low-level frostbite.

She pulls on her gloves in a huff, shoving a large handful of candy into her backpack and barely remembering to lock up before she races out of her apartment complex and down to the bus stop, her morning classes caring exactly zero percent that she’d had too many glasses of wine, alone, scary movies playing on mute.

It’s her third year this far North, yes, but her first Halloween alone since she’d sublet her current place.

If she hurries, she thinks, she’ll have time to drop off some of the excess chocolate for Arya between classes and work. She promised and Dany keeps her promises, especially for her favorite (if only) roommate.

But even with that cheery prospect, she frowns as she stares out of the wide, grimy window and watches the blocks pass by, store owners already out stringing lights and garland by the armful. Christmas, out of every holiday on the list, is by far the most overrated.

\------------

The University of Winterfell at White Harbor has an excellent law program.

If they didn’t, there’s no way Dany would have spent years here, freezing her ass off constantly, for a degree she could’ve stayed and gotten on Dragonstone.

But they do, and here she is, but she’s gotten the hang on things, now. Her life has a pattern and routine, or it did, before everything had gone off the rails three months ago. In the time since, though, she’s learned a new pattern, and so she gives Davos at the security desk a wave and two tiny Snickers that she knows are his favorite as she writes her name on a bright yellow visitor’s badge.

He knows who she is and why she’s at the hospital at 2 pm on a Wednesday, and she smiles at his ‘Thanks, Dany!’ that drifts her way before the elevator doors close.

She peeks into her stash as she rides, glad to see she’s managed not to scarf down too many before she came, the flash of silver wrappers signalling plenty of 3 Musketeers for Arya, and a few brown wrapped candies that she knows are Milky Ways.

Those are Jon’s favorite.

She’s not sure if he’ll come today, but she brought them anyway, just in case.

The chime overhead tells her she’s reached the third floor, and she gives Myrcella at the nurse’s station a nod as she passes, heading towards the end of the hall.

Room 312, her destination, isn’t closed off today. The door is open, and she can hear the television on, an action movie, from the sound of it. She stops just outside the room and wills herself to relax, because if someone’s in there, it’s definitely Jon, and she needs to stomp this strange crush into oblivion before she embarasses herself.

She steps into the room, and sure enough, there he is, still in his paramedic uniform. It’s early for him to be off; In the past three months she’s learned his schedule, just like he knows hers. They’re Arya’s only regular visitors, after all.

“You’re early,” she says with a small smile, walking into the room and tossing her backpack on a nearby, very uncomfortable chair.

Jon Stark gives her an answering grin, eyes crinkling in the corners as he looks up from the playing cards laid out before him. “Technically I’m still on shift for two more hours. Slow day.” He taps the beeper hooked on his belt. “They know how to reach me.”

She hums and rustles through her bag, pulling out the small wrapped chocolate candies and crossing to the petite girl hooked to the maze of wires and tubes and monitors. “As promised,” she proclaims, dropping the silver-papered candy bars on Arya’s bedside table. Her lips turn down as she takes a moment to study Arya’s wan, pale face.

Then she turns, and wiggles her hand in front of Jon, who is eyeing the Milky Ways in her palm hungrily. She snatches her hand away just as he reaches forward. “Not so fast,” she cautions in a song-song voice. “You didn’t say trick or treat.”

“Dany.” His voice is monotone, almost bored, but his dark eyes dance as he frowns. “Hand ‘em over.” He waits several beats but she does not relent, and finally, with a heavy sigh, he gives her what she wants. “Trick or treat.”

Dany narrows her eyes and pretends to study him. “Treat, I think,” she says, and drops the coveted candies on top of his cards. “I shudder to think what sorts of tricks you might resort to.”

Jon looks vaguely offended, but is soon preoccupied with wrestling his candy from the wrapper. He pops it into his mouth and groans in contentment, then addresses her around a mouthful of chocolate and caramel. “Good call. I’m very devious.” He swallows his bite and it rises between them, that heady, electric sort of tension that’s been popping up between them increasingly as time goes by. Neither of them speak, and they both look around awkwardly until Jon clears his throat. “How were your classes?”

It’s an innocuous question and she gladly takes the lifeline he’s thrown. “Same as always. Endless.” She drags over the chair to sit opposite the small, wooden table he’s at, snd begins to gather the cards. She shuffles as he smiles and works another candy free. “Pick your poison.”

Jon cracks his knuckles and relaxes back in his chair. “Crazy Eights. Extra Crazy.”

That means including the new rules they’ve been making each time they play, and she cackles with glee. “Get ready to lose your cash, buddy.” Extra Crazy rules usually meant real money wagers.

Jon waggles his brows at her daringly, and knicks his knuckles on the table. “Shut up and deal, Dany.”

His shift is long-over by the time the alarm on her phone goes off at 6:00 p.m. and her pockets are thirty dollars heavier as she stands to leave. She doesn’t have to go far; spending so much time here since Arya’s accident, since the coma, she’d overheard they were hiring for someone at the front desk, just to staff it until visiting hours ended at 10:00. The pay isn’t great but she likes being here.

Sometimes, if he’s bored, or his schedule changes and he’s on second shift, Jon is still there, too. Every now and then he stops by with a cup of lukewarm coffee from the machine, or a blueberry muffin from the cafeteria.

She likes this more than she should.

She knows he does, too, so she plays along in this shy little dance.

Dany wonders, as she bids him a taunting farewell and gives Arya a quick squeeze of her hand, if he enjoys it as much as she does.

With the way his eyes seem to track her every step as she leaves, she thinks he might.

————-

White Harbor is a cold place most of the year but the way November slides past is particularly bitter in the port town. Still, she braves it, as she goes on about her routine.

She bustles up, teeth chattering as she waits for her bus, and it’s school and then her visit to the hospital, then work, and then back home again.

In the mix, every day, in some way, shape, or form, is Arya’s cousin Jon Stark.

The rest of the family is in Winterfell, a few hours’ drive, and Dany is thankful that the best neurologist in the North is here and not closer to the Stark ancestral home, or she’d never get to see Arya as much as she does. 

And, she thinks, allowing a tiny private smile as she sees Jon waiting by the Emergency Room entrance after her shift, if they’d moved Arya she likely wouldn’t have met Jon at all.

That would be a tragedy, she knows, but a part of her still feels a little guilty, that her visits here are almost as much to see Jon as they are to see her comatose roommate and friend.

“Hey,” he says nervously, just inside the automatic doors. “Arya’s mom asked if I could go by the apartment and grab some of Aryans pictures? She wants them for Thanksgiving, I think, some ‘thing’ she’s doing.”

“Oh.” The air rushes out of her lungs, heart beginning to race at the prospect of being alone in the apartment with the very source of her huge and immature crush. “Sure, walk with me.”

She sounds more confident than she feels, a minor miracle, and it smooths the minor worry lines on his face as he begins to match her pace, strolling next to her into the night.

Jon is quiet as they walk, all darting eyes and nervous glances, things she mirrors back. If Arya were here, now, she knows the dark-haired girl would scold her for her lack of bravery where Arya’s favorite cousin is concerned.

In the entire time since she’s known Arya, the Stark girl has been on a crusade to fix Dany up with Jon, and Dany always, without fail, said no.

The thing that makes her heart sing and break in equal measure is that now Dany knows her friend was right. Jon really IS perfect for her, by any metric or standard, and now Arya can’t crow loud ‘I told you so’s’ from the rooftops.

If she was here to see the way Jon’s eyes hang on Dany’s lips, or the way she flushes cherry red around him, Arya would never let them hear the end of it.

As it stands, Arya won’t be telling anyone, anything. Probably ever again.

Her breath creates a white cloud around her face as she buzzes them in, and she wonders, idly, how long she has until she is forced to take on a replacement roommate. She doubts the Starks will pay Arya’s half in perpetuity.

She won’t think about it now, she swears, unlocking the door and giving Jon a tight, tense smile. “C’mon in,” she breathes, and she can smell something on him, aftershave, or cologne, something he doesn’t normally wear.

It’s nice, whatever it is, and the idea that maybe he’s taken extra care in getting ready to see her has her stomach flipping giddily inside her.

Dany flips on some lights, greeting the two cats that emerge from her darkened bedroom as she watches Jon surreptitiously study the place.

He whistles between his teeth and she can’t help but giggle at how impressed he looks. “Nice,” he says, then remembers himself. “Which room is Arya’s?” Rhaegal, the orange tabby, comes to wind between Jon’s legs, and he bends down to scratch along the cat’s back. She turns away quickly, her chest feeling tight, swallowing hard. Dany gestures and he disappears and she takes a moment to just BREATHE.

She feeds the cats in his absence, wills herself to relax. She’s just to the point that she feels like she can take a full chest full of air when he returns, left hand clutching a loose handful of pictures.

“Found ‘em,” he says, and makes a show of tucking the photographs in his back pocket. He stands at the counter, just feet from her, white teeth digging into his full bottom lip as his eyes catch and cling with hers. “So.” His jaw works and she waits. “Thanksgiving is in, like, five days.”

Dany snorted and moved to the sink to wash her hands, cats now sorted. “You don’t say.”

His wheedling tone was nearly forcing a laugh from her, and she fought to keep a straight face as he found his way over to her again. “The Starks have a big thing every year.”

Dany rolls her eyes and backs against the counter hear the sink, crossing her arms across her chest, lips twisted in a wry smile. “I know, Jon. Arya has invited me every since we’ve lived together and every year I’ve said no.” The unspoken difference this year hangs heavy between them, but to Jon’s credit he allowed only a momentary grimace before continuing.

“I’m aware,” he said. “That’s why I’m inviting you this year—“

Dany held up a hand and cut him off. “Jon, I’m fine, I don’t need to come impose on a family function—“

Jon’s eyes are unsure but hold hers steadily enough as he completes his original statement, talking over her interruption. “—as my date.”

The word echoes around the small kitchen, she thinks, over and over, ‘as my date’ replaying itself in her fevered mind. Her lips form a small ‘o’ of surprise, because she hadn’t expected that. But it isn’t unwelcome. “Oh,” she says, and runs her index finger along a grout line on the counter as she rolls this new possibility over in her mind. “Um, yeah, okay?” She shrugs and laughs. “If you want to, sure. Yeah.”

She thinks he might pass out from shock. “Yeah?” He winces at how high his voice goes and they both laugh.

“Yeah,” Dany confirms, and nods, and they grin at each other like idiots for a solid minute before something changes. He steps closer.

“I gotta say,” he rasps out, taking a second step, “I’m glad to be out of that hospital for a little while.”

Dany hums in agreement. “Same,” she says, and clasps her hands together in front of her, not sure what to do with them as he gives her a hooded, hungry look, only inches now separating them as he glances between her own lips and eyes.

He really is so handsome, Jon Stark is. She’s thought so since she met him, but the way he’s looking at her, here under the fluorescent light strip, makes her wonder how any man can look so indecently good in such shitty lighting.

“It was getting hard to be in Arya’s room. Almost unbearable.”

She cocks her head, curious. “Why?”

Dany shivers, almost imperceptibly, when his hand flashes out to slide one silver curling lock of hair away from her cheek and behind her ear. “Well,” he whispers, “when we’re there, it’s like I can’t hear myself think over Arya screeching in my head.”

She feels hypnotized by his low voice, by the way his lips move as he speaks, the way his fingers graze the sharp angle of her cheekbone as if on instinct. “What’s she saying, in your head?”

The way his tongue darts out, pink and wet, to moisten his lips makes her almost dizzy. From this close, she can almost taste him, and Gods how she wants to, but something keeps stopping her. Maybe it’s fear, or doubt, or just that she’s been driven mad by so many Christmas carols on the radio, too early in the season.

Whatever it is, she’s unprepared for it and floored by it, when takes a quick, steadying breath and lowers his face, lips twisting in a knowing grin as he cups her jaw in his palm. “Usually, it’s ‘Kiss her already, you dumb fuck!’, or something along those lines.” She can smell mint on his breath as he brushes his nose against the tip of hers. He’s so warm, everywhere, his hand on her cheek and his body so achingly close, and she leans into his heat as she lets out a low chuckle.

He makes no move forward, his eyes holding hers prisoner, waiting for something, she realizes, some sign that she wants him to do it as much as he appears to.

There isn’t anything she wants more, in this moment, so she slips her hand up along his shoulder to curl around his neck, the dark, curly hair not caught up and held back in an elastic ticking against her skin where she touches him. “Well, say what you will about Arya,” she pauses, and lets her other hand join with her first, linking her fingers behind his neck and peering up at him in a way she hopes is coy and not creepy. “She gives good advice.”

His lips are full and firm and she feels them curl up the moment he presses them against hers. He kisses her first, yes, but she’s the first to tease her tongue against his lips and beg entry to his mouth, the first to taste that sweet spearmint heaven, the first to make him moan when the tip of her tongue finds his and flicks.

Their mouths part only long enough to suck in fast, quick breaths before they devour each other again. Kissing him seems to set free this starving animal inside her, one that craves only the way his right hand is travelling a delirious little path from the curve of her waist down to her hip. He circles back up, brushing ever close to the swell of her ass, and she thinks he must know how he’s starting to make her crazy.

He pulls away, and she whimpers, and she would be embarrassed by the display if she couldn’t feel the hard, stiff length of him pressed against her through his jeans and her black slacks. “So you’ll go to Thanksgiving, then?” His voice catches when she slips two fingers under the fabric at his waist, pushing past the thin t-shirt he wears under a dark blue sweater and finding bare skin.

“I already said yes.” She rolls her head up slowly to meet his eyes. “But definitely if we’re going to make out there. I mean, I don’t think it would be right to go and NOT do the sorts of things Arya would want us to.”

Jon raises a brow but lets his hands drop to her hips, and pulls her tighter against him. “Like shock her mother with scandalous behavior.”

Dany presses her lips together, even though they tremble, barely containing the giggle that wants to escape. “Exactly.”

“Then, of course. When you put it that way I don’t think we have any other choice.” He drops another kiss to her lips, this one tender, and gentle, and she knows he’s going to bid her goodbye before he speaks again. “I’ll pick you up at noon, yeah?”

She wants to ask him to stay, but this just doesn’t feel like the right time. So she shoves down her wants and tickles the back of his neck with her fingers. “Deal,” she says, with an air of finality. “Now take your pictures and hit the road, buster.”

\-------------

She sees him before then, of course; Dany still finds him in the afternoon hours, as she usually does, in Arya’s room. Sometimes he’s just come off a call and she sees him down at the ER entrance, but most days he’s dealt himself a hand of solitaire and is watching trashy daytime television and running an one-sided narration of events to an all-but-lifeless Arya.

Dany has felt guilty, in the week that has passed, because stealing kisses from Jon Stark on the hospital elevator, or splitting an ice cream sundae from the cafeteria, is making her more happy than she can ever remember being.

It’s hard to welcome that when she looks at the reason they are both daily visitors. Arya’s prognosis isn’t good; She had suffered multiple traumatic injuries following a freak accident - falling down three flights of stairs at the apartment stairwell hadn’t really been on anyone’s radar, but it had happened, and it had been Dany who found her, and sometimes when she closes her eyes at night she can still see her small-framed friend there, dark hair fanned out on the concrete landing, every part of her body seeming bent at an unnatural angle.

So yes, she feels guilty even though she knows she shouldn’t. She knows Arya would be absolutely fucking giddy if she were to open her eyes that moment and learn that Dany and Jon had finally met. She would be over the moon to be told that she was, in fact, right.

Being right is Arya’s favorite. Dany can't bring herself to say that it was Arya’s favorite, not yet, at least.

Some of that unearned guilt is still swirling through her when Jon picks her up Thanksgiving day in his silver Jeep, and there’s something in his eyes, a brief forlorn flash as he glances at the rearview mirror, that makes her think he feels it, too. They are thirty minutes in when she reaches over, without a word, and takes his hand. He says nothing when he tugs at her palm and pulls their laced fingers to rest, together, on his knee.

“I’m glad you came,” Jon whispers, and there is such full and genuine emotion in those choked syllables that she feels her eyes begin to well.

“Me, too,” she says, and smiles sweetly at him as he raises her knuckles to his lips and kisses.

\-------------

Thanksgiving is hectic at House Stark but it’s also alive. It’s thrilling in a way she isn’t used to, if she’s being honest. When she was a girl they had large, lavish dinners, yes, but they were formal affairs, her mother and father playing the perfect hosts, and she and Vis were often tucked away out of sight in a room with whatever Nanny her middle brother hadn’t been able to run off yet.

Rhae had already run away, by then, run off to Dorne and married his high-school sweetheart. Of all of them, she thinks Rhae had the right idea all along. Her parents are dead, now, but she doesn’t feel some aching hole when the holidays pass and she doesn’t see them. She never saw them, anyway. She’s used to it.

But House Stark isn’t formal in the slightest. No one is dressed formally, no shirts are starched, and there are children running in and out of every room she steps into.

She can smell mulled cider as they pass into a dark, wood-panelled entryway, and she barely feels Jon take her coat, tugging the sleeves down her arms as her mouth falls open in wonder. “This place is amazing,” she says, enraptured by everything her eyes rest upon next. Her mother would have hated this place, because as they walk from room to room she sees every surface covered in something festive. The clean lines and austere aesthetic Rhaella Targaryen had fostered would be starved out in Winterfell. There are gourds and ears of dried corn, cornucopias and turkeys and as they enter the dining room she sees that even the place settings are on little pioneer belt-buckles, in the style worn by the First Men of the North.

“It’s like Fall took a massive shit, everywhere.” He’s being sarcastic, she can tell by the fond light in his eyes as he looks down the long, ornately decorated table.

“It’s wonderful,” she whispers, wistfully. This is how she has always pictured it in her mind, the way holidays ought to be done, with full effort and heart. Heart is in abundance here, and then a woman is accosting them, laughing brightly and giving Jon a warm, welcoming hug before wheeling about.

Dany knows who she is, of course. She has seen Cat Stark every other weekend in White Harbor, in room 312.

“Oh, Dany!” Cat’s eyes are wet as she pulls back from the firm hug she’s given Daenerys. “Oh, I’m so happy you came!” She’s unnerved and moved, in equal measure, by the way her presence has affected this woman.

She isn’t sure anyone’s ever been so glad to see her.

“Thank you for having me,” she manages in a scratchy voice. With a nervous laugh she shakes her head and clears her throat. “Sorry about that. You have a lovely home. It’s just gorgeous. I love your decorations.”

The woman’s eyes light up. “Really?” Another hug comes, quick and hard, then she is being taken by the shoulders and marched into the kitchen, a beaming Cat Stark just behind her, Jon bringing up the end and laughing quietly under his breath. “Ned,” Cat calls out as they walk, “Dany here just said she loves my decorations.”

Ned Stark appears, drying his hands on a dish towel, and though he is usually more stoic than his wife he gives her a hug as well, drawing back to do the same to Jon when he answers. “Dany doesn’t have to live with them, dear.” He cuts his eyes to Jon. “There’s a fucking jack-o-lantern on the back of the toilet, Jon. It starts making spooky damned noises the minute you sit down. I nearly had a fucking heart attack.”

“Ned,” Cat snaps good-naturedly, “I took that down already, that was Halloween.” She winks at Dany. “Now it’s a turkey that starts yelling ‘Don’t eat me! Please!’ when someone passes by.”

Ned grumbles, “‘S fucking unsettling, that’s what it is.”

Whatever complaint he meant to lodge next is swept to the side as the rest of the Stark realize Dany is there. They swoop down on her in turns, with a hug, or a mug of cider being pushed into her hands, or a plate of cookies. She and Jon spend at least an hour playing one of the most convoluted and complicated drinking games she’s ever seen, and she still doesn’t understand the rules, but by the end they’re all pleasantly buzzed, so according to her date that means they’ve won.

The rest of the day is one of the most surreal, idyllic experiences of Dany’s life. It is as she thought - it’s a family dynamic she isn’t used to, people who want to be around each other and enjoy doing just that, and she isn’t quite sure where she fits into this puzzle, or if she does at all.

At first, it was Arya who was her link to these people, this life they lived while everyone else did the same, but now there’s something new, with dark gray eyes and a sweet, sinful smile and an ass that absolutely will not stop tormenting her. She knows Jon isn’t always quite sure he fits with this rowdy, happy group any more than she does.

But maybe together, they do. Maybe together they fit here perfectly.

When he takes her home she wants to ask him to stay, but again, it’s just not quite right. She’s too bleary-eyed to fully enjoy taking him to bed, so she tells herself that it can wait for another night when she’s more able to participate in the sort of gymnastics she’s imagined with him.

When he kisses her goodnight she wonders how she’s made it this long, not knowing exactly how that felt, every day.

She finds herself, wobbly-kneed and suddenly teary, in Arya’s darkened room.

“Thanks,” she whispers to the shadows, and she doesn’t stay to see if they answer her back.


End file.
